1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to electronic circuits, and more specifically to buffer circuits used for driving capacitive loads.
2. Description of the Related Art
In integrated circuits, CMOS inverters are often used as buffers to drive on-chip and off-chip capacitive loads. Typically, a single-stage buffer comprising one inverter is not sufficient to drive capacitive loads that are excessively large, so a series of gradually scaled-up stages are configured together to create a “super buffer.” While super buffers are effective in driving large capacitive loads, they are relatively complex and consequently they consume a significant amount of chip area. The teachings of Kang, et al., “CMOS Digital Integrated Circuits,” and Rabaey, “Digital Integrated Circuits,” both of which are herein incorporated by reference, discuss the operability of the super buffer design.